Monday, October 21, 2013

Went to Sony Pictures Animation last Saturday for a preview screening of "The Smurfs: The Legend of Smurfy Hollow." As with their recent Christmas special, this special is mostly hand-drawn with CGI bookends. Read more about the release here. It's available on DVD and digital download and will also be shown on ABC Family's 13 Nights of Halloween (which overall has a pretty good lineup of spooky movies from many different studios) on October 27th. For a Halloween movie night it makes a great lead-in to a viewing of Hotel Transylvania.

Here's a slideshow of different photos I've taken at their studio lot, including more from last Saturday. Click here to see it even bigger.

Monday, October 14, 2013

Was about to just post this picture of the Free Birds movie standee but also got e-mailed some pictures of their recent premiere. This one seems the most representative:

And also just found out you can listen to Social Distortion's track on the film's soundtrack album at Rolling Stone; the soundtrack is due October 29th through Relativity Music Group. Is this only the second animated Thanksgiving movie after A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving?

Thursday, October 10, 2013

I don't know if there will be new animation involved in this (sounds like there won't be) but it's good to see The Three Caballeros, Donald, José and Panchito, back in action. A new holiday celebration at Disney California Adventure park from November 15 - January 6 will feature the pan-American amigos taking over Paradise Gardens and bringing it "to life with festive music, vibrant colors, jubilant dancing, character appearances, delicious food and fun activities for the whole family."

One benefit of this is that it ups the genuine Disney factor at the second Anaheim park. With any luck I'll be able to get some photos of it later on. A comment from the Disney Parks blog writer, Shawn Slater, confirms that "they’re planning a special line of [merchandise] items just for this event." Even more reason to go.